Bill Clinton lost president's nuclear codes, and nobody found out - Business Insider

Bill Clinton lost president's nuclear codes, and nobody found out - Business Insider

"However, around 2000, according to [Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Gen. Hugh] Shelton, a member of the department within the Pentagon that is responsible for all pieces of the nuclear process was dispatched to the White House to physically look at the codes and ensure they were correct -- a procedure required to happen every 30 days. (The set of codes was to be replaced entirely every four months.)

"That official was told by a presidential aide that President Bill Clinton did have the codes, but was in an important meeting and could not be disturbed.

"The aide assured the official that Clinton took the codes seriously and had them close by. The official was dismayed, but he accepted the excuse and left....

"Shelton and [Secretary of Defense William] Cohen feared the saga would reach the press and become an embarrassing story. But word of the missing codes never made it out, and Shelton's recounting of it in his 2010 book was, to his knowledge, the first time it had been shared publicly."